China

By Robert Samuelson and Washington Post Writers Group, January 24, 2011

WASHINGTON -- By all appearances, last week's visit of Chinese president Hu Jintao to Washington changed little in the lopsided American-Chinese relationship. What we have is a system that methodically transfers American jobs, technology and financial power to China in return for only modest Chinese support for important U.S. geopolitical goals: the suppression of Iran's and North Korea's nuclear weapons programs. American officials act as if there's not much they can do to change this.

As of today, China's government has still failed to acknowledge its responsibility for the Tiananmen massacre of 1989. The demonstrators who were gunned down by the People's Liberation Army that summer had originally assembled in Tiananmen Square to pay respects to the recently deceased Hu Yaobang, a Communist Party reformer who favored a more liberal and responsive government. The massacre, commonly known in China as "June Four," will have its 25th anniversary today. An excellent introduction to the story of the massacre is Louisa Lim's new book, "The People's Republic of Amnesia: Tiananmen Revisited.

By Robert Samuelson and Washington Post Writers Group, September 27, 2010

WASHINGTON-- No one familiar with the Smoot-Hawley tariff of 1930 should relish the prospect of a trade war with China -- but that seems to be where we're headed and is probably where we should be headed. Although the Smoot-Hawley tariff did not cause the Great Depression, it contributed to its severity by provoking widespread retaliation. Confronting China's export subsidies risks a similar tit-for-tat cycle at a time when the global economic recovery is weak. This is a risk, unfortunately, we need to take.

Encore Development is awaiting approval from Osceola County to develop the old Splendid China theme-park site on U.S. Highway 192 as a $700 million mixed-use "residential resort" with homes and short-term rentals. Jim Bagley, who heads Encore Development, said his company submitted plans to the county 60 days ago and hopes to start work in July or August on a community to be called Rolling Oaks. The Orlando-based company last year purchased the 315-acre site, where the theme park operated for a decade starting in 1993.

WASHINGTON -- Even China? Could the world's economic juggernaut, having grown an average of 10 percent annually for three decades, face a slowdown or what for China would be a recession? Does it have a real estate "bubble" about to "pop"? What would be the global consequences? Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner visits China and Japan this week. These questions form a backdrop. With Europe's slump and America's sluggish economy, a sizable Chinese slowdown would be bad news. China inspires ambivalence.

HONG KONG -- China has to find a way to continue its rapid growth without choking to death. Literally. When I landed in Beijing last week, the sky was a brownish miasma through which distant landmarks were only faintly visible. The moment I stepped outside the city's vast international airport, I noticed an acrid hint of burning coal in the all-too-palpable air. The next day, when I went to see the Great Wall, China's most famous cultural treasure was wreathed in a gauzy shroud of pollution.

NEWPORT, R.I. -- Scholars at the Naval War College here probably nodded in vigorous agreement with a recent lecture delivered at another military institution 130 miles away. Speaking at West Point to leaders of tomorrow's Army, Defense Secretary Robert Gates said "any future defense secretary who advises the president to again send a big American land army into Asia or into the Middle East or Africa should 'have his head examined,' as General MacArthur so delicately put it. " This underscored Gates' point that "the most plausible, high-end scenarios for the U.S. military are primarily naval and air engagements -- whether in Asia, the Persian Gulf, or elsewhere.

It was big news around the world: China has "overtaken" Japan as the world's second-richest economy. Except, well, it's not really news, it's not really big, and it's not entirely true. Let's take the last part first. Yes, technically, China's gross domestic product is now slightly ahead of Japan's. But GDP is a gross statistic. It doesn't tell you nearly as much as you might think. In a very real way, China is still poorer than Japan. It's also poorer than Tunisia, Ecuador, Gabon, Kazakhstan and Namibia.

By Compiled from Sentinel services by John Gholdston. Compiled from Sentinel services by John Gholdston, April 6, 1985

BIBLE PRINTING. A newly formed Chinese Christian agency, Amity Foundation, and the United Bible Societies have ''come to an understanding which is hoped to lead to establishment of a modern printing facility'' in China, the American Bible Society announced. Ownership and control of the plant will be under the direction of the Chinese foundation but the plant mostly would be used to print Bibles and Christian publications for use in China.THE LAST WORD SPENCER W. KIMBALL, 90-YEAR-OLD PRESIDENT OF THE 5.7 MILLION-MEMBER CHURCH OF JESUS CHRIST OF LATTER-DAY SAINTS, ON EASTER: ''JUST AS THE EARTH BLOSSOMS ANEW EACH SPRING AFTER THE DEAD OF WINTER, SO THE SAVIOUR OF THE WORLD, THROUGH HIS GREAT ATONING SACRIFICE, ASSURED US NEW LIFE AFTER OUR EARTHLY DEATH.

In 2008, I wrote a book called "Liberal Fascism. " That title came from H.G. Wells, one of the most important socialist writers in the English language. He believed, as did his fellow Fabian socialists, that Western democratic capitalism had outlived its usefulness. What was needed was a new, bold, forward-thinking system run by experts with access to the most modern techniques. For Wells, the label for such a system mattered less than the imperative that we implement a revolution-from-above.

China executed a soft landing of an unmanned probe on the moon for the first time Saturday. The U.S. and Russia are the only other countries to have matched the feat. Earlier this year, China put three astronauts in orbit, and it plans to build a space station by 2020. It is also developing a satellite network to compete with the GPS system. Should the United States be concerned about the advances in China's space program? Should the U.S. put invest more money and attention into its own space program to stay ahead of China?

The technology to make an effective 3-D imprint gun does not currently exist ("Renew gun ban," Dec. 5). Ones that have been made are for demonstrations and fictional scenarios for TV or movies. To be effective an equally plastic ammunition would have to be developed - and the task of making a lethal plastic bullet is rather daunting. Simple testing, at the insistence of the NRA, found that more than enough metal is present in all so-called plastic guns, including the Glock, so that the most basic detector had no problem detecting them.

How sad it was, watching a little boy tell Jimmy Kimmel that the solution to our American prosperity lies in killing the Chinese. As the grandfather of twin 8-year-old boys, I would ask where such an idea originated: from a parent, a neighbor, a playmate or possibly even an uninformed teacher? I would tell my grandsons that, sadly, the majority of Americans know little about China, aside from having seen Disney's "Mulan" or pictures of the Great Wall. I would tell them that to understand another culture or country, the most memorable way to do so is to go there.

In recent weeks, Chinese-American communities across the U.S. have organized to protest a segment on "Jimmy Kimmel Live" on Oct. 16, in which a child suggested that killing everyone in China is the way for America to resolve its debt crisis. As a Chinese-American, I'd like to explain why it is not right to joke about killing everyone in China. First, it is against the universal value that has been championed by Americans: We should respect lives and treat people equally and humanely.

WHAT: "The New Face of China," a collection of oil and acrylic paintings and pencil and watercolor drawings, presents artist Ming Zhou's view of the rising middle class of China. Using marked color contrasts, saturation and distortion Zhou provides a look at perceived status and what constitutes "good taste. " Originally from Shanghai, China, Zhou is the recipient of several honors, including a recent Best of Show award at a national juried art exhibition at the Lander Art Center in Wyoming.

BEIJING -- Even the briefest acquaintance with this smoggy, sprawling capital is basis enough to conclude that much of the campaign rhetoric we're hearing about China is unrealistic, dishonest or just dumb. This is my first visit to China, and I plan to spend the next few columns reporting what I see and learn. I spent enough years as a foreign correspondent to know how tricky first impressions can be. The subtleties and complexities of any society are -- unsurprisingly -- subtle and complex.

BEIJING -- Don't hold your breath waiting for any kind of Occupy Beijing movement to set up camp. Visitors to Tiananmen Square must pass through airport-style security checkpoints, and nobody is likely to try smuggling in a protest sign, much less a tent. The vast, wind-whipped plaza is a quiet place. China's leaders intend to keep it that way. Walk away from the square in any direction, however, and soon you find yourself amid a raucous riot of commerce. Whatever you've read about the speed and scale of development here, you have no idea until you see it with your own eyes.

With all that is going wrong in the Middle East, with our health-care system being nationalized, with our cities, counties, and states being bankrupted by unsustainable public-employee pensions, and with our economy suffering from government interference and over-regulation, it's understandable that one of the most important - and worrisome - headlines of recent news cycles was outright ignored or missed by most in power, most in the media, and most...

A 43-year-old Mount Dora man is dead and his girlfiend is charged with first degree murder. Sheila Brothers, 44, told Mount Dora police that she grabbed a gun she kept in a china cabinet before following Michael Hyland, 43, and firing two shots at him sometime before 1:48 a.m. Monday, according to police. Officers arrived at the home on 610 S. Highland St. and found Hyland on the bathroom floor with a gunshot wound to the chest. He was pronounced dead at Florida Hospital Waterman in Tavares.